Hyrum Smith, during his lectures on, “The Reality Model,” would often talk about the concept of writing things on ones “belief window” without realizing that he or she was doing it.
The easiest way to understand this concept is to think of baby immediately after birth. When I was in the delivery room with my wife during the births of my three children, immediately after birth the doctor would give the child a slap on the butt, and this would cause the newborn to cry and at the same time start inhaling and exhaling air in and out of the lungs. The child would keep crying until it was held by the mother and comforted. Next the child would cry when it was hungry, and it would be fed. It would cry when it needed its diaper changed and someone would change the diaper.
So, the first belief the child wrote on its believe window was that crying was a good thing. As the child grew and aged, more things were written on its belief window either through experience or because information and rules were told to the child by parents, teachers, and friends.
As the child became an adult more and more beliefs were written on the belief window due to both empirical and exogenous factors. Sometimes we might make mistakes in the way we process the exogenous data and that causes to create a belief that is incorrect.
When beliefs are wrong, negative, or harmful, they can act as barriers to personal growth and happiness.
The truth is that it is more than likely that we have written a lot of garbage on our belief window and ultimately this garbage will lead us to a lot of misconceptions and ultimately retard our personal growth.
There are two more things that we must discuss, the two natural laws and the effects of addictions.
The first natural law, “If the results of your behavior do not meet your needs over time, then you have an incorrect belief.
The second is, results take time to measure.”
So, if you are constantly not getting the result you want and you feel you have given your actions time to achieve the results you are looking for, then clearly you have a bad belief as the foundation of your action.
An addiction is compulsive behavior with short-term benefits and long-term destruction. It can trick you into thinking that something is meeting your needs when it is causing you great harm. Most people, when they hear the word addiction, think of substance abuse such as alcohol or drugs but there are many other addictions which are primarily behavior addictions such as overeating or procrastination.
So, let's put it all together and apply it to a real-life example of a financial advisor.
When a financial advisor is told when he or she goes through training that opening new accounts is a good thing. Rewarding advisors for each new accounts they open reinforces this principle. It is therefore not hard to see why early in their careers financial advisors develop a mantra of “Open Accounts, Open Accounts, Open Accounts.” Since they are being rewarded for each new account they open, they believe that this mantra meets their needs. Sooner or later, they develop an addiction to opening any account they can. In this process they sow the seeds of long-term destruction because they are not properly managing their business due to a bad belief given to them by someone else who they thought was giving them good advice. Unfortunately, this happens all of the time.
Here is a partial solution. Every month you should try to examine all the things you wrote on your belief window and ask yourself the question, “what do I believe that is wrong.” This exercise will allow you to scrutinize the canvas of your minds and get rid of a lot of bad beliefs before they do their damage to your thoughts, actions and ultimately to your reality.
In conclusion, getting rid of bad beliefs is an important process. You can free yourself from the constraints of limiting beliefs and create a more positive and fulfilling life. To do so requires self-awareness, critical thinking, perseverance,
and often seeking the help of a mentor or coach.
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